1. Field
The present disclosure relates generally to a serial interface. More specifically, the present disclosure relates to a serial interface used between an RF transceiver integrated circuit (IC) chip and a baseband IC chip.
2. Related Art
Traditional wireless communication systems are usually designed for a specific standard, such as GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications), Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (W-CDMA), Wi-Fi®(registered trademark of Wi-Fi Alliance of Austin, Tex.), LTE (Long Term Evolution), just to name a few. Current demand for the convergence of wireless services, so that users can access different standards from the same wireless device, is driving the development of multi-standard and multi-band transceivers, which are capable of transmitting/receiving radio signals in the entire wireless communication spectrum (most are in a frequency range of from 300 MHz to 3.6 GHz).
The multi-band/multi-standard requirement also drives the need for developing a high-speed, low-overhead serial digital interface between the RF IC chip and the baseband IC chip on the wireless transceiver. However, interfaces defined by the current standard (such as the DigRFSM specification, available at the homepage of the MIPI® Alliance, mipi.org) often require complex redesign of the RF IC chip and the baseband chip, and can be energy inefficient.